Meta

Fabletics: Figuring Out Modern Consumers

Every few years, consumers develop new ways of determining final purchases. For the better part of the last century, major contributing factors always included traditional marketing and advertising. Companies used to have all the power to persuade their customers to buy the next hottest item on the market.

These days, that power lies with the customers. Over the years, people lost faith in traditional marketing and now rely on each other for honest opinions and feedback about particular products and services. This type of crowd-sourced information, online reviews, allowed savvier brands to capitalize on this trend by adopting more review-centric marketing strategies.

Like with most changes in consumer behavior, this trend came after a change in the relationship between companies and their customers. As the world became more digital, a lot of e-commerce companies appeared overnight. Unfortunately, some of these businesses sell low-quality products for more money than the competition.

That fraudulent behavior caused a rift between companies and customers. Now, people spend a lot of time researching businesses and their products or services long before buying anything. Part of that in-depth research period is reading a lot of user reviews. There’s a safety in the opinions of people who’ve already had experience with that brand.

One brand that’s having no trouble adapting to this consumer is Fabletics. Fabletics is an activewear brand that uses a subscription mechanic to sell directly to its members. They also use that close contact with their members to form relationships and learn about the women buying their products.

From the beginning, Fabletics wanted to do something never done before. The idea: offer every type of woman on-trend fashion that they could actually afford. The personalized service and inspirational vibe of Fabletics were just bonus features. Fabletics must be doing something because their members love the brand.

Members also love Kate Hudson, co-founder of Fabletics. The first thing that Hudson wanted to do with the brand was to ensure that it’d sell high-quality fashion at affordable prices. Even though she’s a celebrity, she didn’t want to sell exclusively to her rich friends. She wanted all women to be able to buy on-trend athleisure outfits that made them look and feel their best.

That’s why she’s so hands-on with the company. Every week, she sits down and looks over sales numbers to determine which items are selling and which aren’t.